Anton Marking | ANTON - The Anton is a rare patented cap lamp with a very short lifetime. Marked in a shield under an Eagle Trade Mark *ST*AR* GEO. T. ANTON & BROTHER MONONGAHELA, PA. PAT. JUNE 20 1916 on the right side of the water tank, its most interesting features are the square top and the socket reflector. Height to the top of the water door is 4 1/16 in. and the base dia. is 2 in. The lamp is all brass with a screw-socketed 2 1/4 in. dia. brass reflector and an early smooth-sided Justrite base. The lamp is an early version that follows the patent, especially the strap cap braces that are attached to the front sides of the lamp. This lamp is featured in Fig. 3 on pg. 216 in Dave Thorpe’s Carbide Light – The Last Flame in American Mines. (Arguably the Antons were the premier wick lamp makers in the U. S. In 1874, brothers George, John and Christopher each set up workshops to manufacture wick lamps for local PA coal miners; later on, George and John combined their operations and marketed their lamps worldwide under the George Anton name; the Geo. Anton STAR brand lamp, first sold in 1898, was the best selling wick lamp of its time due to the quality construction and attractive logo; in 1905 George Anton withdrew from the business and the name was changed to J. Anton and Son; the son named George T. Anton took over the business when his father retired and changed its name to Geo. T. Anton and Brother. The bother was named John B. Anton and it is John B’s patent for a carbide lamp that brought the Anton’s into the carbide lamp business. However, their carbide lamp business seemed doomed from the start. John B. Anton’s patent application for a lamp with a screw-socket reflector was filed March 22, 1916. Augie Hansen of Justrite filed a patent application for The Buddy lamp, also with a screw-socket reflector, several months earlier. A US Patent Office hearing determined that Anton’s application included a working model and thus was awarded a patent on June 20, 1916 while Hansen’s The Buddy patent was denied due to interference with Anton’s patent. The Buddy lamp died a very quick death (see The Buddy lamp later in the cap lamp pics) and surviving examples are quite scarce. The Anton lamp although receiving a patent did not fare well either and within a year, the company ceased production. Anton’s square topped lamps are also quite scarce as well and highly sought by collectors. By 1918, the Anton business ceased production of all mine lamps and eventually became a wholesale supplier to tinners and roofers. See Thorpe, Beneath the Surface – Inventors and Marketeers of the Miners’ Carbide Light, pp 102-110)